crossing_lostrp | [Daniel] Day 11: Grim News (tag all)

By the time Daniel gathered the majority of the survivors around the cookfire, it was writ on many of the faces that the news had already trickled down the metaphorical grapevine. What was the saying? Good news travels fast, but bad news travels faster?

He looked out at the eclectic assortment of people, from different walks of life with different knowledge and different skills, all thrown together into this community due plane crashes, spaceship crashes, misdirected wormholes, and rips in the fabric of time. All brought here by people or beings unknown with reasons just as unfamiliar and unknown, with the slowly waning hope that they would ever be rescued.

Taking off his glasses, Daniel pinched the bridge of his nose. He thought for a moment, tossing out the previously rehearsed words in favor of just speaking from his heart and his head. He wasn't going to give empty platitudes or hollow words, these people didn't want to hear that and truly, he hated the sound of such things.

"As I'm sure most of you may have heard, Lucy Brightman is no longer with us. She took her own life this morning and drowned in the ocean. Plans are being made to retrieve her body from the reef, and there will be a burial and a memorial service. If anyone would like to say a few words, then please see me and we'll make arrangements. If anyone has any questions, please feel free to see me or Blaise."

The hardest part over, Daniel took and released a breath. "Now, unfortunately, as callous as it sounds, Lucy is gone, yes, but the camp is still here and we still have to survive another day. There is still food to be gathered: foraging, fishing, snares, and possibly boar pits to be dug. A raft is being built to retrieve the body, and any help with salvaging logs or materials to strap them together would be a great help.

"Most importantly, and I *cannot* stress this enough, talk to one another. Everyone here, we are all a community now and we need to pay attention to the needs of one another and the general feeling within the camp." His gaze nearly strayed to Clarice, but he resisted. She was pushing herself again, trying to hold it together while helping with the raft and as much as he wanted to tell her not to, he didn't think that preventing her help would be good for her; of course, he wasn't sure that her helping was good for her either. "Help one another.

"Any questions?"

"I have a question," Shannon piped up.

"Yes, Shannon?"

"What's going to happen to her stuff?" Shannon looked around, speaking over the rumbling growls and indignant mutterings, "What? It's a practical question. Survival. Isn't that what Daniel was just talking about? Life goes on? He can say it, but I can't?"